Requiem

Antonio Tabucchi

"Requiem's narrator has an appointment on a quay in Lisbon at twelve, and when that turns out to mean not noon but midnight, he has a long time to while away. As the day unfolds, he has many encounters: with a young junkie, a taxi driver who is not familiar with the streets, several waiters, a gypsy, a cemetery keeper, the mysterious Isabel, an accordionist - in all, almost two dozen people, both real and illusory. Finally he meets The Guest, the ghost of the long dead great poet Fernando Pessoa. Part travelogue, part autobiography, part fiction, and even a bit of a cookbook, Requiem becomes an homage to a country and its people, and a farewell to the past as the narrator lays claim to a literary forebear."--Jacket.